


the city's ours until the fall

by Book_Junkie007



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Jossed, Journey, M/M, implied Bellarke as on the show, post-s2, season 3 speculation pre-SDCC, where it can be read as there or not there
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-27
Updated: 2015-08-27
Packaged: 2018-04-17 13:22:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4668104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Book_Junkie007/pseuds/Book_Junkie007
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bellamy gives Wick a look of gratitude, as if that’s what he was expecting Wick to understand.  And maybe Wick does.  Everyone who was in Mount Weather has changed, and it’s evident in the way they interact with each other.  It’s noticeable with the kids, and Wick thinks he’s starting to see the changes in himself.  He’s a bit too serious at times, less likely to joke now, although he also feels like he should be joking; that that’s his spot in the group.  Not someone to be trusted with taking the life of another person, and yet here he is.  Man, beat a guy to death once, and everyone sees you as someone to be respected.  Which is a twisted bit of respect, but it’s still there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the city's ours until the fall

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this fic originally started out as an idea for a Wick/Lincoln/Bellamy BrOTP fic, where they sat around and got to know each other over a few drinks or whatever. Then the 100 Big Bang happened, so this became the first half of a 30k season 3 speculation fic, which has since been Jossed (thanks, SDCC; there's no way they're going to do a time jump between seasons, right? Wrong).
> 
> Thank you to [readlikeagirl](readlikeagirl.tumblr.com) and [kedawen](kedawen.tumblr.com) for betaing this monster. Thank you to [dedalvs](dedalvs.tumblr.com) for helping me out with the Trigedasleng translation.
> 
> This is my first time writing for the 100 fandom beyond a Bellarke smut piece, so please leave me a review!
> 
> You can find me on [Tumblr](book-junkie007.tumblr.com).

Three days have passed since they returned from Mount Weather, and Wick has spent all his time either in medical with Raven or in the engineering room working. There are radios to fix, weapons and storage to figure out, and sleeping quarters to find for the delinquents who survived Mount Weather. Wick notices that they have a tendency to stick together, and if anyone is out of sight for longer than two minutes, others will start looking for them to make sure they are okay. Which means that tents big enough to fit several people at a time would have to be made for temporary shelter, and they still have to figure out what they are doing for winter.

When he decides he’s had enough of working in engineering, Wick decides to make his way to the mess hall for some food. Maybe he’ll take some to Raven as well. God only knows that she’s probably going stir crazy in the med bay while people tell her to slow down and take it easy. Raven is tough though, and Wick is surprised she has stayed put this long.

Wick quickly fills a tray and is making his way to the med bay when his eyes fall on a lone figure sitting at a table off to the side. It’s Bellamy Blake, a guy who was infamous back on the Ark and who Wick had talked to over a radio, but has never really met. Rumours are flowing that he knew Clarke left but hadn’t told anyone until more people realised she was gone, and then he finally told Chancellor Griffin. Wick decides he wants to learn more about him so he changes course and approaches Bellamy’s table.

"Hey, Wick, I noticed that you don't have anyone to eat with. Why don't you join me? Sure, Bellamy, I'd love to," Wick says as he sets his tray down.

Bellamy gives him a strange look before replying, “Hey, want to sit down?”

“Sure, I mean, I was going to go see Raven, but that can wait.”

Bellamy nods in understanding. “Thanks for joining me then.”

They both eat silently for a few moments, Wick studying him out of the corner of his eye. Bellamy is a lot more… subdued than he was expecting. From the stories Raven tells, he had expected Bellamy to be a lot angrier, maybe more chaotic. The fact that his attitude is so tempered is a surprise, especially based on the stories that Bellamy shot Chancellor Jaha solely so he could go to the ground with his sister.

“Can I join you?” A deep voice pulls Wick out of his thoughts, and he looks up to see a heavily tattooed man with a tray in his hands standing beside their table.

“Sure,” Bellamy agrees easily, nodding his head at the chair beside him. “Where’s O?”

“With the others who were in Mount Weather. She wanted to check in with Monty, and suggested that I come eat with you,” Lincoln says in a way that makes Wick think that Octavia had strongly suggested it.

“I don’t have a problem with it,” says Wick, and Lincoln pulls out his chair and sits down beside Bellamy. Wick hasn’t met Lincoln before, but from the stories he hears from Raven about the man, he expects they will get along fine, even if he doesn’t speak a lot. Wick can compensate.

“Hi, I’m Wick,” Wick offers his hand.

“Lincoln,” he responds, and grasps Wick’s forearm, leaving Wick to return the grip for a few moments before letting go.

“So, what’s winter like on the ground?” Wick asks after a few moments of silent chewing. Man, these guys can play up the strong and silent card when they want to. “I mean, I’ve read the books and seen the vids, but there isn’t much seasonal variation happening in space, you know?”

Lincoln gives a small smile at that, then proceeds to explain how seasons work on Earth in between bites of food. Wick quickly gets caught up in his explanation of how it would slowly get colder and there would be snow, which he had only seen in video archives. Then it would warm back up and the plants would bloom and it would be easier to find food again.

“It sounds like the myth of Persephone and Demeter,” comments Bellamy, who had been quiet and listening intently the whole time Lincoln was speaking. “You know, the god of the underworld kidnaps Persephone, Demeter’s beloved daughter, and Demeter becomes distraught. Persephone is tricked into eating pomegranate seeds, which means that she has to stay in the underworld for a certain period of time throughout the year, and the seasons are caused by Demeter’s happiness at her daughter’s arrival and her sadness when Persephone has to leave again.”

Wick is fascinated by Bellamy’s story. It seems almost too pretty and poetic for a guy like Bellamy, who is all about strength and survival, to know. He files the information away and glances over at Lincoln who seems equally intrigued by the story.

“Does Octavia know this story?” he asks.

“Yeah, she does. The myths about Persephone were her favourite. You should ask her about them sometime.”

Lincoln nods. “Maybe I will.”

There’s an undercurrent of understanding running between the other two men as they nod at each other and go back to their food.

As they’re finishing up their meal, one of the teenagers rescued from Mount Weather passes by their table. Harper, Wick thinks. It’s obvious Bellamy knows her, though.

“Hey,” he calls out to her. She turns towards him. “You doing okay?”

Harper studies him for a moment before slowly nodding. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Okay, well, let me know if you need anything,” Bellamy says, still studying her. “I’m always here.”

The unspoken mention of Clarke hangs in the air.

“Thanks, Bellamy.”

“No problem, Harper.”

Wick watches as she walks back to where she was heading before turning back to Bellamy.

“You really care about them, don’t you?” he asks.

Bellamy nods. “Yeah, I do. They’re my people.”

Lincoln nods. “Clarke said the same thing about me. Granted, she shot me through the shoulder as she said it, but the meaning was still the same.”

“Why did Clarke shoot you?” Wick asks.

“A cured Mountain Man had a knife to my throat. I told her to let him kill me then shoot him, but she wasn’t willing to let me die.”

“So she shot and killed him through you?” Wick gives a low whistle. “Damn.”

There’s satisfaction and maybe a bit of pride on Bellamy’s face as he’s listening to Lincoln’s story. “You’ve obviously never met Clarke Griffin.”

“Well, I only met her in passing on the Ark, saying hello on my trips to the med bay where she hooked me up with some awesome bandaids. They were neon-coloured. I’ve never met her for a period of time on the ground where we’re trying not to die, so, you know, my knowledge of her may be a bit skewed.”

Bellamy smiles a bit at that. “Well, when she comes back, you’ll be able to get to know her better.”

The fact that Bellamy seems so sure of his words, that Clarke is going to come back even after she left them all, seemingly without thought, makes Wick pause.

“Are you sure she’s going to come back?” he asks.

Bellamy nods. “Definitely. She needs to work through some stuff right now, but I’ll give her… three weeks before she comes back. Either that or she destroys another civilization and culture.”

Wick snorts. “How long have we been on the ground for?”

“Twenty-six days,” Bellamy answers promptly. “And we’ve been on the ground for fifty-five.”

The separation between Bellamy and the original 100 delinquents sent down to Earth from the remaining Ark survivors is not lost on Wick. Watching the Mount Weather survivors interact, it is clear that they have a better handle on how to survive on the ground, but they have become mentally and emotionally compromised in the process. Wick hopes that that won’t happen to anyone else, especially Raven. Although, from the things he’s seen her go through, he’s pretty sure she had it comparatively worse than most of the others, except for maybe Harper. There’s a wariness in her eyes that Wick has seen when she talks to Bellamy, and he doesn’t think that will be going away anytime soon.

“Your people have done well in surviving,” Lincoln compliments Bellamy. “We weren’t sure how long you would survive; we were counting on your deaths.”

“Thanks,” Bellamy says flatly. “Eighty-two alive until the war was pretty good.”

“It was,” Lincoln agrees. “We thought there would only be 52 by the end of the first ten days.”

“Glad to have outshone your expectations,” Bellamy states. “We got smarter by the time Raven came down, made some changes. Made some rules.”

“What kind of rules?” Wick asks, fascinated by their exchange. From what he and the others from the Ark had thought, the delinquents had had no rules and were basically running wild until they showed up.

“No going outside the walls after dark; hunt in groups of three or more; if you do something which is morally unsound, such as murder or attempted murder, you will be banished, not killed…” Bellamy continues listing their rules and Wick listens with rapt attention.

“So how many kids attempted to kill others during those first twenty-nine days? And who the hell decided that the answer to their problems was to kill someone?” Wick inquires.

Bellamy coughs slightly, choosing not to answer.

“After the first ten days, we settled down, got our shit together. Made surviving more of a priority than going off into the woods to fuck…” Bellamy trails off. “I think we had three murders overall, not including the attempt on me and Clarke. The rest were Grounders, illness, acid fog, suicide, general stupidity, self-defense, or a mercy kill.”

“Clarke?” Wick asks over the unspoken implication of the mercy kill.

“Yeah,” Bellamy confirms with a heaviness in his eyes.

Wick lets out a breath. “You grew up fast down here, didn’t you?”

“We had to,” Bellamy says simply.

“I’m starting to see that.”

Wick is quiet for a few moments, thinking about how casually Raven said ‘welcome to the ground’, and how he didn’t fully realise what that meant before he beat a man to death in the name of survival, and how the others seemed to have taken the ‘do anything necessary to survive’ lesson to heart. It was slightly overwhelming.

Wick stares at his plate for a moment. “Well, it’s been real, but I have to go check on Raven.”

“Have to, or want to?” Bellamy interjects pointedly.

“Want to,” Wick clarifies. “Let’s do this again sometime.”

Without waiting for agreeing grunts from either of his dinner companions, he quickly picks up his tray and returns it to the wash area before heading toward the med bay, rushing a bit in his haste to get back to Raven.

\--------

“Hey, sorry I missed dinner. I found Bellamy and decided to sit with him, and Lincoln joined us.”

Raven gives him a long stare and arches an eyebrow. “You mean you invited yourself to sit down at Bellamy’s table and he allowed you. I’m impressed. Why was Lincoln there though?”

“Octavia basically forced Lincoln to go eat with Bellamy. Dunno why.”

“Ah,” Raven’s tone is one of clear understanding. “And? How was it?”

Wick thinks for a moment. “Quiet. I think they would have been happy to eat in silence if I hadn’t asked about the seasons changing.”

“Yeah? How’d that go? Didn’t realise you were interested in how the world turned beyond the gravitational pull.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Wick says offhandedly, although how gravitational pulls worked was awesome. “It was interesting. What I got from it by the end is that I both do and do not want to experience the seasons changing. Plus Bellamy is a mythology nerd.”

“Huh.”

“Yeah, he told the story of Persephone, and I was not expecting that. An explanation of how to disassemble and reassemble a gun in five minutes or less, but not stories about ancient gods and goddesses. Lincoln didn’t seem surprised though.”

“Maybe he already knew Bellamy was a closet history buff?”

“Maybe.”

“So, what did Jackson say about your leg today?” Wick asks.

They spend a few moments discussing her recovery before the conversation turns to other topics, like radios and how they should be preparing for winter, and whether Lincoln has told the council what to expect when winter arrives.

When it grows late enough that Raven kicks Wick out to try and get some sleep he stands up from his chair.

“All right, all right, I get it. Get some rest wrench monkey. See you tomorrow.” He reaches out to squeeze Raven’s hand.

“Later. Don’t let the ghosts keep you up,” she replies.

Wick sleeps fitfully that night, images of Raven being brought down from her handcuffs and laid out on the operating table flash behind his eyes. He strains against his own handcuffs, trying to reach her, help her, but he can’t. He wakes with a jolt, his heart beating quickly against his ribs and his legs tangled in his blanket. He closes his eyes and lets out a long breath, willing the images in his head to go away while trying to regain his breathing. He never does really go back to sleep that night.

\--------

The next day, after a morning spent in the engineering section, working on radios and trying to help figure out where the wreckage of the Ark could have landed, Wick finally peels himself away from his work and makes his way over to the mess hall for lunch. As he passes through the yard, he notices Octavia and Lincoln struggling in the dirt. Lincoln is on his back, with Octavia straddling his thighs and attempting to pin his arms down.

“Alright, Octavia?” Wick calls. He knows about Octavia; hell, everyone on the Ark knew about Octavia after she’d been discovered, but he had never held a conversation with her face to face until after they all came to the ground. He finds her to be incredibly brash, with a ‘take no shit’ attitude that he admires. After limited conversations with her during the lead up to the break in of Mount Weather, he decided that she is now one of his favourite delinquents. He senses that she doesn’t seem to have any loyalty except for toward her brother, but that’s understandable, considering he was her whole world at one point.

“Fine,” she growls back, finally managing to keep Lincoln’s arms on the dirt for longer than a moment. After a few seconds, she throws up her arms and declares, “I win!”

“That you did,” Lincoln says, sitting up so Octavia is sprawled across his lap. “Well done.”

Octavia gives him a small smile and a nod. “Thank you.”

Lincoln leans forward to quickly brush his lips against Octavia’s before asking, “Should we go eat?”

“Definitely.” Octavia gets gets gracefully to her feet before offering Lincoln a hand up, which he accepts, rising easily.

“Want to eat with us?” Octavia asks, glancing over at Wick.

Wick pauses for a moment before saying, “Sure.”

Octavia nods as they continue on their way to the mess hall, queuing up for rations before heading to an empty table.

“Where’s Bellamy?” Wick asks as they place their trays on the table and pull out chairs.

“Probably eating with Miller and Monty,” Octavia answers, scanning the room for her brother. “There,” she says, nodding in the direction of a dark curly head.

“Ah,” Wick says. “He doesn’t want to eat with you?”

“We need our own space sometimes, plus being with Monty is more important than being with me,” she shrugs and turns back to her food.

“Was what Monty went through really that bad?” Wick asks.

“He hooked up the system which allowed Clarke and Bellamy to pull a lever and kill over three hundred people. I don’t think that leads to warm and fuzzy thoughts,” Octavia responds flatly.

“I should check up on him,” Wick muses. “Might help.”

“Possibly. I mean, Jasper isn’t speaking to him right now, and I know they were like brothers.”

“Yeah, they were,” Wick agrees. “Okay, I’ll check in with him later. What are your plans for the rest of the day?”

“Lincoln was going to show me some more fighting techniques, but you’re welcome to join us,” Octavia offers.

Wick hesitates. “I wouldn’t want to impose, plus I should really get back to engineering…”

“One afternoon isn’t going to hurt you. Plus, this is the ground. Raven told me about your first kill, but you need to have more skills than ‘find the closest object and bludgeon the person to death’, even though that can work as well.”

“Alright, I’ll come,” Wick decides. “Just let me tell the guys I won’t be back this afternoon, then I’ll come find you.”

“Deal,” Octavia says and the three of them turn back to their food.

After Wick finishes up, he jogs over to engineering. It takes him a few moments to find Sinclair in the crowded area.

“Hey,” Wick says to Sinclair as he fiddles with a panel. “I might not be back today. Something came up, and I want to follow through with it.”

“Is it Raven?” Sinclair asks.

“Nah, she’s fine. I’ve been offered the great opportunity to be able to save my own ass. I figured I should probably take it up.”

“Sounds fine. See you tomorrow then, or later tonight.”

With a wave of acknowledgement from Sinclair, Wick heads out to look for Lincoln and Octavia.

“Hey,” he says as he approaches them. “So how is this going to work?”

“Hey!” Octavia greets brightly. “I think Lincoln wants to show us some moves and then have us practice with each other.”

“Okay. Does he know that the only punches I’ve thrown are when people are drunk and call me ugly?”

“No, but I do now,” Lincoln laughs.

“Great.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll start you out slow,” Lincoln reassures him.

“Just how I like it,” Wick jokes before they all get serious and Lincoln starts teaching.

Wick finds Lincoln to be a good teacher, going through the movements slowly, making sure Wick understands what he’s supposed to do, and clarifying when Wick seems unsure or asks to see it again. It’s when he has to start practicing with Octavia that he runs into problems.

“Come on, you can hit harder than that,” Octavia cajoles after a particularly weak punch of his, barely touching her shoulder.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he protests.

Octavia shrugs him off. “I’ll heal. Besides, _ge smak daun, gyon op nodotaim_.”

“Sorry, what?” Wick asks.

“It’s a Tri Kru saying, which means, get knocked down, pick yourself up.”

“Ah, I see,” he says. “Is there a saying for ‘I’m just a poor boy, nobody loves me’?”

Lincoln gives a small smile before saying, “ _Ai jos laik kwelen skat, non hod ai in_.”

“Awesome. Could you repeat that, but slower?”

Lincoln nods before going through what he said more slowly, emphasizing his pronunciation and making sure Wick has it.

“ _Ai jos laik kwelen skat, non hod ai in_. He’s just a poor boy, from a poor family,” Wick almost sings.

“Queen? Nice choice,” Octavia says appreciatively.

“You know them?” Wick asks.

“Of course. Bell used to listen to them all the time if he wasn’t listening to the Beatles or the Eagles.”

“That man has good taste.”

“Easy come, easy go, will you let me go? Bismillah! No, we will not let you go,” Octavia sings.

“Let him go!” Wick responds.

Wick and Octavia call and respond through the rest of the song before they get back to training.

“You’re not going to hurt me,” Octavia encourages him once again. “Just do it.”

Wick attempts to go through his moves once more, trying to hit Octavia a bit harder. After another hour, Lincoln calls it quits.

“You should rest now,” he says. “Training is good, but part of training is knowing when to stop and not push yourself further for the day.”

Wick stretches out his arms and legs before heading over to engineering to see if there’s anything which needs to be done before dinner. He hangs out there for a bit, helping the guys with the radios before heading over to the mess hall for supper. He grabs a tray and heads over to the med bay, where he finds Raven.

“Hey,” he says, sitting in the chair beside her. “How are you? Braid anyone’s hair today?”

“I’m so bored,” she groans. “But Jackson said I can leave tomorrow, so I’m psyched for that.”

“Excellent.” Wick grins. “Moving back to your old tent?”

“Yeah, why?” Raven seems suspicious.

“No reason,” Wick says quickly. “Just glad you’re going to be able to leave this place.”

“Uh-huh. So, what did you do today?”

Wick explains about running into Lincoln and Octavia, and training with them for part of the afternoon. Raven bursts out laughing.

“Really? You? You went up against Octavia? Did she kick your ass?”

Wick rubs the back of his neck. “Not really. I was more afraid of hitting her too hard, to be honest.”

Raven snorts. “That girl is made of steel. You wouldn’t be able to hurt her if she didn’t let you.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“Welcome,” she chirps. “How are the radios coming along? Are your designs comparable to what I would be able to build, even without being able to go look for parts? I’d only be too happy to fix any mistakes you’ve made.”

“We’re getting there,” Wick says, and describes the system they’re designing, what they’re doing to improve their range, and what they were doing to try and figure out where the rest of the Ark came down. “I mean, our piece alone was the size of a football stadium. It shouldn’t be this hard to find the other ten stations.”

“Mount Weather was jamming us pretty good. But don’t worry, we’ll get it.”

“I hope so.” Wick hesitates before placing a hand beside Raven’s on the bed, close, but not quite touching her.

Raven gives him a small smile before turning back to her food.

When they’re finished, Wick stands up and turns to leave. “Later, Reyes.”

“Wait, you’re going?”

“Yeah. Thought I would go find Monty, see how he was doing.”

Raven sticks her bottom lip out a bit. “I was gonna ask if you wanted to play cards with me or something.”

“Can do,” Wick agrees, almost too quickly.

“Awesome.” Raven grabs a deck of cards from beside her table. “I’m so going to kick your ass at poker.”

Wick grins. “Bring it on, wrench monkey,” sitting back down and putting his tray on the floor.

After a few intense rounds of poker, where the winning hand would just barely be better than the other, their idle chatter turns more serious.

“So, you’re really going to move back to your tent?” Wick asks.

“Well, yeah. Where else am I going to go?”

“You could move in with me, free up a tent for the teenagers,” Wick says casually.

Raven scoffs, “And why would I want to do that?”

“Because you asked me not to leave you, so I’m not gonna. Figure out your personal shit yet?”

“Kind of. I mean, I do know that I want to have something with you… maybe, but we jumped into having sex, and I kind of didn’t realise how much it would suck afterward. I did that once before, and I should have known to not make the same mistake again.”

“Hey, I get it. Emotions were running high, we weren’t sure if we were going to die, and we almost did.”

“Yeah, except the last time I did this, I was the guy’s second choice from the beginning.” Raven bites her bottom lip, vulnerability in her eyes.

“Hey, Reyes, you’re my first choice. I’ll always pick you first.”

“That’s what Clarke said too.”

“And she was right. You shouldn’t have to be anyone’s second choice.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” says Wick firmly.

They play a few more rounds before it grows late enough for Wick to have to leave. He leans forward, his lips stopping before hitting her cheek, glancing over to make sure she’s okay with it before brushing his lips against her skin.

“Later, Reyes.”

“Bye, Wick.”

\--------

Wick sleeps relatively well that night, no nightmares waking him, so he wakes up feeling almost decent.

When looking for a place to sit to eat breakfast, he sees Monty sitting by himself, his head low over his tray. Wick heads straight over to him.

“Hey, stranger. What’s shaking?” he asks, plopping his breakfast down.

“Atoms, molecules, quarks… You know, the usual,” Monty says.

“Sounds about right. How are you doing? Haven’t really seen you since we came back.”

“I’m okay,” Monty says. “Just haven’t really felt like speaking to anyone.”

“Ah. Well, how about you don’t speak, but come work with me in engineering? We’re still working on the radios, and could use an extra set of hands. Surprised they haven’t roped you into doing it yet.”

“I was told I need time to ‘recover’,” Monty rolls his eyes. “As if anyone can really recover from what we went through here on the ground.”

“Really?” Wick asks. “What do you do instead?”

“Push the pain aside and live through it. Don’t think about what’s happened, because you’re only going to psych yourself out. Keep moving forward, keep surviving.”

“Wise words coming from a fifteen year old.”

“Sixteen. I think I had my birthday about a week ago,” Monty says quietly.

“Sixteen,” Wick corrects himself, “and you’ve already been through hell.”

“Basically,” Monty shrugs, as if it isn’t that big of a deal.

“My condolences, and I hope you continue to survive through it.”

“Thanks. I heard your innocence was taken too.”

Wick snorts. “My innocence was taken a long time ago. Sorry to disappoint.”

“You know what I mean. Raven told me how you bludgeoned a man to death. It’s not something you get over easily.”

Wick pauses. “No, I guess not. But it’s strange to think that I have the blood of a man on my hands.”

Monty shrugs. “You have less than me. I have 300 deaths on my hands.”

Wick leans forward. “But you didn’t pull the lever. That counts for something.”

“Does it really? It’s like saying I didn’t detonate the first atomic bomb, but I still built another version of it.”

“Well, then you’re going to have to figure out how to deal with it.”

“It’s why Clarke left,” Monty muses. “Bellamy said she said she couldn’t bear to see the people she saved, so she decided to go live with the ghosts.”

“She’ll come back soon,” Wick reassures him.

“Maybe,” Monty says thoughtfully. “Or maybe she’ll just never come back.”

“Bellamy seems pretty sure she’s coming back.”

Monty lets out a breath and nods. “Then she’s coming back. I trust him. I trust both of them.”

“Good. So do you want to come hang out in engineering?”

“Sure.”

They finish their breakfast and head over to engineering. Wick notices some of the others giving Monty looks out of the corners of their eyes, as if they’re concerned about him being there, but Monty seems to ignore it, so he does as well.

They work quietly throughout the afternoon only speaking when absolutely necessary. They finally finish off the last of the radios, and start working on the main transmitter which has been Raven’s baby up until this point. Monty walks around it, examining it from every angle.

“Raven’s done a good job,” he says.

“Yeah,” Wick responds with pride in his voice, “she has.”

“I’m always amazed at what she can make only using what she can find, which usually isn’t much, if anything. She has a talent for seeing what she has and what it can become instead of worrying about what she doesn’t have, which seems to be a rare ability amongst the Ark engineers.”

“Yeah,” Wick agrees. “Her thinking on the fly saved our asses in the mountain. Or, it almost did.”

“Sounds about right. She blew up a bridge that survived an apocalyptic war using a tin can and some rocket fuel.”

“She told me about that. Anything to survive, right?”

“Yes,” Monty replies without hesitation, but a shadow passes across his features. “Although if it’s morally unsound, you should die instead.”

“Like the people in Mount Weather?” Wick asks softly.

“Some of them,” Monty says softly. “Not the children, but Clarke and Bellamy had a choice, and they chose us over the innocent. Their people over the ones who had locked us up. And I think that was pretty brave.”

“It was, wasn’t it?” Wick comments gently.

“I can understand why Clarke made the decision she did, and I can understand why she needed to leave. I can’t fault her for that.”

“You’re not the only one,” Wick says, thinking of Bellamy.

“Bellamy understands too,” Monty says. “He usually does when it comes to Clarke.”

“They’re two sides of the same coin, aren't they?”

“Yeah, they are. Maybe not at first, but they are now.” Monty looks far away for a moment.

“I have a hard time believing that. They seem like they’re really close.”

“They weren’t in the beginning. At first they were kind of caustic with each other. They’ve learned to work together, but it was really bad when we landed. Bellamy was all about the chaos and Clarke wanted to be able to survive.” Monty shrugs.

Wick raises his eyebrows. “Really? Damn…”

“Something changed when we experienced our first acid fog. He started respecting her after that, and didn’t treat her as someone who was more entitled and above the rest of us. The rest of them just kind of fell into line after that.”

“Did you need to fall into line?” Wick asks with a bit of a smile, although it seems like that wasn’t the case.

“Nah, I was always team Clarke. She’s saved our asses more than once. We need her.”

“Until she thinks you don’t,” Wick realises. “Could that be why she left?”

“Maybe. I mean, we have Bellamy, and he’ll be able to keep us together, fight for our rights and decisions, but Clarke was more of the big picture. Bellamy’s the small stuff.”

“But maybe that’s what you need right now.”

Monty nods. “I hope she finds herself and comes back though. I miss her.”

“That seems to be the general consensus,” Wick agrees.

“Unless you’re one of the people who currently hate her. Let’s get back to work on this transmitter.”

They work on the transmitter for a few more hours, and eventually they have something which they think will work as a fix.

“We’ll try it out tomorrow,” Wick says. “I’m hungry and just want to eat and see Raven right now.”

“Sounds good. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

They exit the tent and walk together to the mess hall before splitting off into separate lines to grab dinner. Wick watches Monty walk over to Bellamy and sit down with him. Smiling slightly to himself, he takes his tray and heads to see Raven.

\--------

“Thank god,” Raven moans, taking the tray from him as soon as he holds it out to her.

“You’re welcome,” Wick laughs. “If all it took to get a moan out of you was to bring you food I would have done it sooner.

Raven raises an eyebrow. “Instead of sleeping with me?”

“Well, no, because you were sexy when you were moaning then, too.” There’s a slight awkwardness in the air between them now.

Raven coughs. “I have good news.”

“What is it?”

“I’m being released. They’ve decided that there’s no point in making me stay since I can heal just as well out of here.” She shrugs.

Wick thinks he gets it now. “Is this your roundabout way of asking if you can share a tent with me? Reyes, all you had to do was ask.” He grins and Raven rolls her eyes.

“Well, you know me.” And he does. “But, would you mind? Separate beds, of course,” she adds quickly.

“Of course,” he agrees. If she’s not ready for them to move forward, or to have figured out what she wants them to be, he’s not going to push.

The relief is clearly visible on her face. “I would go back to my old tent, but I think there are delinquents in it, and I don’t want to kick them out if I don’t have to.”

“It seems like things are always changing here, and not always for the better,” Wick says.

“Welcome to the ground,” she echoes. “If you’re not fast enough or don’t adapt quickly, you die.”

The matter of fact way she says it makes him realise yet again how much she’s changed since she’s come to the ground. She’s not the woman who was happy with taking spacewalks and fixing things anymore. Well, maybe she still is, but she also has another layer to her; a layer that has been hardened by her experiences on the ground to the point where Wick doesn’t recognize her as a person from the Ark. She’s delinquent like the rest of them, which is evident in the way she carries herself - full of wariness, yet still confident - and how she speaks. He’s noticed that the original delinquents who were sent to the ground hold themselves apart from the rest of the people off the Ark - creating an _us versus them_ dynamic - and Raven easily slots herself in with the delinquents. 

He hopes that she eventually lets him back in enough that they can pick up where they left off, but he isn’t in a rush. He’ll be there when she’s ready.

They finish eating, and Raven gathers the few things around her bed before heading out with Wick to her old tent to pick up the last of her things. Wick watches as Raven allows herself to be convinced to sit down and catch up with the two girls in her old tent, chatting easily with them about what’s happened to them in the past few days. He senses they’re all deliberately avoiding mentioning Mount Weather.

“I’ll talk to you soon, okay?” Raven says as she gets up off one of their piles of blankets being used as makeshift beds, and allows the two girls to hug her before making her way out of the tent with Wick in tow. “Later!”

The two girls call out their goodbyes as they exit and start heading towards Wick’s tent.

“God, that was slightly exhausting,” Raven tilts her head back and looks at the sky for a moment.

“You weren’t happy to talk with them?”

“No, I was. It’s just I didn’t realize how much they would want to talk. If I’d known, I would have gone another day.”

“You wouldn’t have, Reyes, and you know it. If there’s one thing I know about you, it’s how much you don’t like talking to people you don’t know.”

“Then how did I wind up talking to you?” she jokes.

“My classic good looks,” he smirks. “But seriously, do you have everything?”

“Everything I need. Anything else I can do without.”

“Good.”

They reach his tent and Wick pulls aside the flap, allowing Raven to enter first. She dumps her pile of blankets on top of his own, then sits.

“I really need to go find some scrap metal or something to make myself a pallet,” she says, closing her eyes and tilting her head back. “But I can do that later.”

“For right now, sleep?” Wick jokes.

“Yes.” Raven kicks off her boots and curls up under her pile of blankets. “Night, Wick.”

“Night, Reyes.”

He hesitates for a few moments, debating whether or not to try making a separate bed that night or just bite the bullet and sleep here with Raven. He shrugs, kicks off his boots, and curls up under his own blankets.

\--------

When Wick wakes up, he finds he rolled over in the middle of the night, and faces Raven’s back. Her hair is loose around her shoulders, somehow coming out of the ponytail in the middle of the night. He watches as she rolls over onto her back and slowly opens her eyes.

“Morning,” she says with a slight yawn.

“Morning,” he replies.

“Walk me to breakfast?”

“Sure.”

They both roll out from under their piles of blankets and Wick mourns the loss of heat. _Bed, we will meet again_ , he thinks as he stretches slowly, working out the kinks in his back before leaning over to grab his boots. After Wick finishes pulling his on, he glances over to see if Raven is done before standing up from his side of bed. He watches as Raven stands and walks over to the bowl and pitcher he has sitting on a table in the corner of his tent. She pours a bit out and uses one of his rags to wash her face; after she finishes, he walks over to the table to do the same. Once they’re both ready, he motions for her to head to the tent entrance before following and pulls the flap aside, allowing her to exit first.

They walk to the mess hall in a comfortable silence, and after they receive their food, Raven looks around until she spots someone, then makes an immediate path over, Wick following behind her.

“Bellamy,” she says, setting down her tray and plopping herself down in a chair.

“Raven. They finally let you out, huh?” Bellamy asks, while scooping up a forkful of food.

“Yep,” she says cheerily. “Watch out, Blake.”

He nods. “You doing okay?”

“Yeah, you?”

Wick has hovered uncertainly beside the table, unsure of whether Raven wants him to join her and Bellamy or if he should find another place to sit.

Bellamy tilts his head up from his food to look at Wick and jokes, “Hey, Wick? Want to sit? Sure, why not?”

“Thanks,” Wick says, sitting down and Bellamy gives him a nod. “How are you? I haven’t seen you in a couple days.”

“Fine,” Bellamy says around a bite of food. “Busy with guard training and attempting to convince the council that it would be okay to go on a hunting trip.”

“Oh, yeah?” Wick asks. “Who would be interested in going?”

“Delinquents for sure, because once you have a taste of fresh meat, this stuff doesn’t seem as good.” Bellamy pokes at his food with his fork.

“What kind of meat have you had?”

“Deer, boar, panther, or at least I think it was panther,” Bellamy shrugs. “Whatever we could catch, really.”

“That sounds interesting. Are you looking for more people to volunteer? Because I think it would be nice to get out of camp without someone trying to kill me. Or something trying to kill me,” he quickly corrects himself.

Bellamy gives a small smile. “Oh, something will still be trying to kill you; this is the ground. But in this case, you would be able to fight back against it.” He considers. “Or run. Running’s sometimes good.”

Wick snorts. “When is running not a good option?”

“When it’s better to stand and fight,” Bellamy says quietly, almost to himself.

“Damn straight,” Raven pipes up, holding a fist out to Bellamy, which he bumps. “Which is the majority of the time.”

“You hanging out in engineering today?” Bellamy asks Raven.

“Yeah, thought I should finally make myself useful again.” Raven shrugs. “Besides, who else will fix this guy’s mistakes?”

Bellamy grins. Wick feels envious of their easy camaraderie for a moment then remembers Raven telling him that she and Bellamy once tried to kill each other. The moment passes.

They finish breakfast quickly then part ways, Raven and Wick heading off to engineering and Bellamy going off to the guards.

They find Monty already in engineering, and he and Wick work on making more radios while Raven fiddles with the transmitter. Shortly before lunch, she calls them over to her station.

“Listen to this,” she says, adjusting the receiver to try and cut through the static. Something finally comes through clear.

_“This is Agro station, do any other stations read us? We are located about two kilometres south of where we were estimated to land. Please come find us.”_

The message loops back on itself and continues to replay.

“Well,” Wick says, looking between Monty and Raven. “Lunch?”

Monty looks up with an almost desperate look in his eye. “No lunch, not yet. I need to figure out where they are. My parents…”

Raven goes over to Monty and slings an arm around his shoulders. “Look, I know you’re worried about your parents. I would be too,” the unspoken _if I’d had a mother who loved me_ hangs in the air. “But you have to think about this logically. That recording is still coming through the airwaves, which means that the system is still running; the electricity still works.”

“But what if something happens to them while we’re eating?”

“I know they’re your people, your family, but we can’t change the fact that we still have to convince the council that we can go, and we still have to figure out where they are, but we will get to them as soon as we can.” Raven reasons.

Monty looks at Raven, a bit of hope in his eyes and some understanding.

“I guess we can go eat,” he relents.

“Excellent idea. Shall we go?”

Raven takes her arm away from Monty’s shoulders, so as they walk to the mess hall, Wick slings his own arm around Monty.

“We’ll figure it out. We always do.”

Monty nods at his reassurance.

After they eat, they head over to find Kane, Abby and the other Council members to report their discovery and figure out a plan of action for finding them.

“We found another station,” Raven says without preamble, leaning on the edge of the table beside Abby Griffin.

“Which one?” Abby asks with new hope.

“Agro,” Wick says promptly. “We just need to figure out what the projection was for the stations to land, and go from there.”

“I’ll pull them up.”

Abby finds the plans in the software and pulls them up onto a bigger screen which had been salvaged and wired together with the software so it worked in a makeshift way which seemed to be the hallmark of being on Earth. If you could find it and make it semi-functional, that was perfect, and nothing more was expected of it.

“Agro was projected to land here,” Abby says, pointing to a spot on the map. “And Camp Jaha is here.” She points to another spot.

“What’s the scale on this?” Monty asks, having been quiet up until this point.

“One grid square is one square kilometre.”

Wick glances to see Monty nod and bite his lip while studying the map.

“It’s about a two day walk,” he says finally, “if we stop for the night, which we should.”

“Okay,” Abby agrees. “I’m going to ask for volunteers at dinner.”

“I’m going,” Monty says instantly.

“So am I,” Wick says, because someone should be along to keep an eye on Monty.

“That’s acceptable. The other volunteers will be chosen tonight,” Abby says.

The rest of the afternoon is spent figuring out supplies and a route for the team to take. Once they’ve hashed out the basics, and it’s time for dinner, they head over to the mess hall in a group.

Wick, Monty, and Raven find an empty table after they receive their rations, and sit.

Once everyone is seated, Abby walks to the head of the hall and raises her voice.

“Excuse me, can I have your attention, please?”

The hall eventually quiets down enough for her to continue speaking.

“Thank you. We had an exciting development today: we managed to catch a recording Agro station is broadcasting, and we’ve figured out where they are approximately. We’re going to have some people check it out, and we’re looking for more volunteers to join them.”

Wick sees Miller stand and call out, “Who’s already volunteered?”

“Monty and Wick were the ones who heard the transmission and they’ve requested to go. Who else is interested?”

Miller shrugs. “I’ll do it.”

Lincoln stands as well. “I’ll come as a guide.”

Octavia practically jumps up from her seat. “Me too.”

“And me.” Bellamy’s voice rings out with a kind of certainty, as if there was never any doubt that he would go.

“I’ll go to help provide medical support,” Jackson’s voice rings out, almost timidly, but with an undercurrent of strength.

“Thank you,” Abby says. “Meet us after supper for details and planning. That’s all.” She heads back to her table.

Once they’re finished eating and return their trays to wash up, Monty and Wick make their way back to the council room while Raven heads toward her tent. Wick doesn’t say anything, but he can sense that today has been wearing on her physically, even if she stayed seated for most of the day.

Bellamy, Lincoln, Octavia, and Miller don’t bother taking seats, choosing to stand along with Wick and Monty while Jackson sits.

“Thank you for volunteering,” Abby says as she comes in and sits at the head of the table. “This is what we were looking at for supplies and a route…”

She outlines their plans and Wick glances over to see Bellamy and Octavia staring at Abby and the maps she’s pulled up intensely, as if they could etch the path into their brains.

Lincoln and Bellamy ask more questions before they seem satisfied and nod at Abby.

“We’ll meet at the gate at dawn,” Bellamy says, glancing around at everyone to see their nods. “Great, that’s settled. Now get some sleep.”

Wick glances over at Abby to make sure they’re truly dismissed, but takes her nod to mean that she agrees. They file out of the room and back towards their tents. Bellamy slings an arm around his sister’s shoulders as they walk.

Wick pulls back the flap to his tent and ducks in, kicking off his boots before flopping on his bed.

“Hey,” a sleepy grumble comes from under a pile of covers.

“Oh, sorry,” Wick rolls over so he’s not on that side of the bed. “Better?”

He hears a grunt in response.

“Okay, so not a talker after having been asleep, got it,” he mumbles under his breath before rolling farther over so he can crawl under the sheets.

He falls asleep almost right away.

\--------

The next morning at dawn, Wick sleepily pulls himself out from under the warmth of the covers and rolls out of bed. He glances down at Raven’s head just barely poking out from underneath the sheets, and idly wonders if she would kick his ass if he kissed the top of her head before he left.

He contents himself with shaking her shoulder beneath the sheets.

“Huh?” she mumbles sleepily.

“I’m heading out. I’ll see you in a week.”

“You better.” She rolls onto her back, her eyes still closed.

“Later, Reyes.”

Raven grunts and rolls to her other side.

Wick pulls on his boots and heads out of the tent towards the gate, grabbing his pack from its resting place along the way.

As he nears the gate, he sees three figures already there and waiting. Two are towering over the third, who seems to be leaning into one of the figures. When he reaches them, it’s Bellamy, Octavia, and Lincoln.

“Morning,” Wick says.

He receives grunts in reply.

“Are we early?” he asks.

“Not necessarily,” Lincoln says. “We might just be the easiest to wake.”

“Yeah, watching out for threats to your life tends to do that,” Bellamy agrees.

“Welcome to the ground?” Wick repeats.

“Yep,” Octavia says, a small smile playing around her lips.

Monty and Miller show up a few minutes later, packs on their backs and rations in their hands that they toss to the others.

“Thanks,” Bellamy says, opening his and popping a handful in his mouth.

“Not a problem,” Miller says. “We thought you might be hungry and forgot to eat.”

“Well, you’re not wrong.” Bellamy pops another handful in his mouth.

“Comforting,” Wick mutters under his breath.

Jackson arrives a few minutes later, wearing a backpack and slightly out of breath. “Sorry, lost track of time.”

“It’s all right,” Bellamy says, glancing around at the others. “Ready to move out?”

At the sight of the others’ nods, he turns toward the guard manning the gate, and signals him to open it. They file through and don’t look back as the gate closes behind them.

“Feels weird to be leaving by the front gate,” Bellamy murmurs.

Wick looks to the side and sees Octavia nodding slightly.

“You mean you haven’t before?” Miller asks.

“Nah, we’ve done more of the ‘sneak out the side after the electricity is turned off’ in the past.”

“Ah,” Miller responds with a nod. Wick takes his tone to be a complete lack of surprise at their previous actions.

“We had to find Finn and Murphy,” Octavia shrugs with a bit of sadness. “So, where are we going?”

Monty stoops to pull out a map from his pack. Wick glances at it over his shoulder after he unfolds it and notices that there are marks all over it.

“We’re here,” Monty points to a spot, “and as far as we can tell, Agro should be about here.” He points at another spot.

“Lincoln, do you know that terrain?” Bellamy asks, looking at Lincoln.

“Yes, it shouldn’t be too difficult of a trek,” Lincoln says.

“Good, we could use things going smoothly for once,” Bellamy says. “So, onward.”

\--------

The walk through the woods remains fairly uneventful, the group breaking off into various pairs for conversation, with Jackson mostly walking on his own, until they stop for lunch. They each pull a ration pack from their bag and sit down in a circle to eat.

“So, how is everyone doing?” Wick asks after taking a bite. “Are we taking odds on the possibility of something going horribly wrong or not going according to plan? I vote ten to one that something goes wrong.”

He glances over to see Jackson go pale while eating his food.

“One to one,” Bellamy says, and shrugs. “What can I say? I’m an optimist.”

“Dude, your optimism sucks,” Wick replies.

Bellamy shrugs one of his shoulders again, perhaps in agreement. “That’s me. Sunshine and butterflies.”

Octavia coughs loudly, as if covering up a laugh.

“Not ‘whatever the hell we want’, and ‘what’s wrong with a little chaos’?” Miller asks, completely straight faced.

“Those too,” Bellamy agrees.

“Four to one,” Monty says.

“How did you get that?” Miller asks curiously.

“Well, there are no Mountain Men to worry about anymore,” a hint of regret colours his voice before he continues. “And we’re mostly at peace with the Grounders, from what you’ve told me, so we won’t be killed indiscriminately by them anymore. So that leaves animals, residual radiation--although I highly doubt that will be an issue, from what I gathered from being in Mount Weather--crazy ass weather, and falling over the side of a cliff.” He ticks off each point on his fingers. “So four to one odds because we aren’t going anywhere near water, so we won’t be attacked by massive sea serpents, or whatever the hell that was.”

Octavia shudders. “Yeah, I’d like to not repeat my experience with those things, thanks.”

“Oh, the full-size ones are worse,” Lincoln says. “They can swallow a man whole.”

“Dude, what kind of a planet is this?” Wick cries. “And why did we ever want to return?”

“Because that was the dream,” Bellamy says quietly. “And look at how that turned out.”

“‘Your beauty can but leave among us / Vague memories, nothing but memories,’” quotes Octavia.

The group lapses into a contemplative silence for a few moments before Wick breaks it.

“What did sodium say to chloride?” he asks.

“What?” Monty asks gamely.

“I’m keeping my eye on you,” Wick says with a slight grin which Monty returns. He looks around to see blank faces on the rest of the group. “Get it? Ions?” He groans. “Ugh, norms.”

“I’m sure Raven finds you very funny,” Miller says, clapping him on the back before standing. “Shall we get moving?”

They pack up their gear before continuing on their way. Monty knocks shoulders with Wick as he passes to catch up to Miller.

“For the record, I thought you were hilarious.”

Wick smiles slightly as he continues to walk.

When night starts to fall, the group gathers in a small clearing and begin to make camp.

“Anyone want to hunt tonight?” Bellamy asks.

“Hunt, like with spears?” Jackson seems shocked.

“Yeah. That’s why we brought them along.”

“Oh.” Jackson’s response is barely a murmur, but when Wick glances over at him, he sees a flicker of interest in the concept of hunting in the other man’s eyes.

“Not particularly,” Miller says, with a quick glance at Jackson. “It’s getting dark, we can hunt tomorrow. Ration packs are good enough for me.”

“All right,” Bellamy says.

They pull out rations and start a fire, settling in for a quiet meal.

“Who wants first watch?” Miller asks.

“I’ll do it,” Bellamy says instantly.

“I’ll take second,” Octavia volunteers.

“And I’ll do third.” Lincoln states.

“Great. Wick, Monty, and I can do it on the way back,” Miller says, looking at Monty and Wick for nods of agreement, which he receives.

“What about me?” Jackson asks.

“You’re good. We need you well-rested in case you need to heal someone,” Bellamy says.

Jackson nods a bit reluctantly. “Okay.”

Wick wonders if Bellamy isn’t sure whether Jackson could do what would be needed, in order to protect himself and the rest of their group. If it came down to life or death, would Jackson be able to defend himself? Jackson had shown that he has a sense of loyalty to his people by agreeing to come along on this trip, and Wick respects that. Wick supposes he should take it as some sort of fucked up badge of honour that Bellamy trusts him enough to stand watch, to be able to do what needs to be done if it comes down to it.

They discuss the route they’re going to take tomorrow, and ask Lincoln questions about the terrain they’re going to face until it’s time to rest.

\--------

Wick sleeps through the night, only stirring a few times and falling quickly back asleep after spotting Bellamy or Octavia keeping watch, their backs up against a tree.

He wakes the next morning in the early dawn light to Miller’s face leaning over his while shaking his shoulder gently.

“Hey, man,” Wick says, sitting up as Miller sits back on his heels.

“Hey,” he replies. “We’re going to eat a quick breakfast and then head back out.”

“Sounds good.”

They sit around the slowly dying fire, quietly eating their rations, and Wick desperately wishes for some of the stuff which passed for coffee on the Ark, if only to help him be more alert. Octavia, Bellamy, Miller, and Monty all look fully awake, there’s no sign that two of them kept watch in the night. Lincoln looks alert as well, but then again, he’s probably well-adjusted to early starts.

“Ready to go?” Bellamy asks quietly, not wanting to break the early morning silence.

He’s met with nods as they all gather up trash and shove it back in their packs. Wick takes it upon himself to throw dirt on the fire and then stomp on it, just to be thorough. They pick up their guns and spears and swords and continue on their way.

Shortly before midday, Lincoln holds out his arm to quiet them.

“Do you hear that?” he asks.

“Hear what?” Wick is about to say, before he hears it. It’s a very quiet shuffling of leaves farther out in the trees.

The others look at each other and nod before pulling out their weapons and facing outward towards the threat. Wick hastily raises his spear in a defensive position and joins them in their circle.

“ _Chon belaik yu?_ ” A woman’s voice comes from the trees, but Wick can’t see her yet.

“ _Ai laik Belomi kom skaikru,_ ” Bellamy responds, his voice clear and strong.

Wick is a bit impressed, if he’s honest. He doesn’t know if he would be able to face a Grounder head on, the way the kids from the original drop ship seem to be able to.

“ _Belomi?_ ” the woman asks, emerging from the trees, nodding to her left and right where a group of men and women flank her, her group coming to be eight. “Not the Bellamy who was in the Mountain?” she switches to English.

“One and the same,” Bellamy says, lowering his gun a little, but not enough that he can’t easily get it in position if need be.

“You let us out of the cages. Helped us become free,” she continues.

Bellamy nods. “For what good it did us. The Commander left my people to die.”

“But you’re still here,” she says, her voice questioning. “What did you do?”

“What we had to do to survive.” Bellamy’s voice is tight.

She nods in understanding. “And the Mountain Men?”

“Won’t be a problem to anyone ever again. We made sure of that.”

“We?” she inquires.

“Clarke and me.”

Recognition flashes in her eyes. “Ah, yes, I’ve heard of Clarke of the Sky People. Who hasn’t by now?”

“Become a legend, has she?” Bellamy half laughs.

“Yes. Who are you to her?”

Bellamy pauses for a moment, and it seems to Wick that he’s unsure of what he should say to this women he doesn’t know. Hell, does he even know what he and Clarke are? Sometimes Wick doesn’t think so, from what little he’s heard about their interactions.

“I’m her second,” he says finally. “Who are you?”

“Apologies,” she says. “I’m Cova.”

“Nice to meet you,” Bellamy says with a nod of respect. “Actually, I’m wondering if you would be willing to help us.”

“Help you with what, exactly?” Cova asks.

“Just wondering if you have some information for us. Have you seen a ship crash a bit farther out from here?”

“Maybe. Are they more of your people?” she asks.

“Yes. We didn’t have contact with them because of the Mountain Men, but we were hoping we would be able to check on them, make sure they’re doing okay, maybe convince them to come back to our main camp.”

Cova nods slowly. “Which would get them out of our territory.”

“Yes, exactly,” Bellamy says. “And if we make contact with any other crashed ships, we’ll be able to get those people out of your territory as well.”

Wick glances over to the side, trying to read Lincoln’s views on this interaction, and how he thinks that this conversation is going to finish: with peace or with bloodshed. He doesn’t see any reaction from the other man other than a slight tension in his shoulders. Wick thinks that might be somewhat normal for a man who turned his back on his own people for the woman he loved countless times, although he doesn’t seem to fit in with the Sky People either.

“I can take you to them,” Cova says. “It might be faster than you trying to go through unfamiliar woods by yourselves.”

Wick glances over at Bellamy, whose jaw has tightened slightly. His eyes are stormy, presumably attempting to read the intentions behind her offer. Finally, Bellamy’s jaw relaxes almost imperceptibly before he speaks.

“Thank you,” Bellamy says, his eyes moving over Cova and her people.

She nods in response. “Follow me.”

The group of delinquents moves to fall in behind the Grounders and Bellamy waits until he’s walking beside Wick before saying quietly, “Make sure to stay alert.” He nods at a Grounder woman walking slightly ahead of them.

Wick glances over at the woman before side-eying Bellamy. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. Better safe than sorry. Wanna make sure they aren't going to lead us to our death or steal our supplies or something.”

Wick nods in understanding. “Got it.”

“Good,” Bellamy says, and Wick watches as he slides up beside Miller, presumably to tell him something along the same lines as what he told Wick.

“Are you ready?” a soft voice asks beside him, making him jump. He glances over and sees Octavia, her hair still in braids, and her face grimy.

“Ready for what?” Wick asks.

“To survive; to fight for your life, if it comes down to it?”

“Well, I did beat that guy’s head in with a piece of pipe, so I guess I’m as ready as I’ll ever be,” Wick says uncertainly.

Octavia nods. “It’s a hard adjustment, living on the ground, but you’ve done well.” Her voice is serene, almost as if she isn’t casually discussing ending someone’s life.

“Thanks,” he says slowly. “Do you ever get used to it?”

Octavia considers. “I think if you did, others would become worried about you.”

Wick tilts the edges of his lips up. He doesn’t know if he’s capable of giving a full smile right now. From what he can tell, those are few and far between on the ground. “Good to know.”

Octavia nods and Wick watches as she catches up to Lincoln, walking beside him once more. Wick sees Monty walking by himself a bit farther behind the group and drops back to walk with him.

“How are you doing?”

“Not bad. It’s weird to be out in the open, when, you know, we weren’t quite sure if we’d be seeing the sun again, but it’s not horrible. It’s almost like the first couple days again, when we could just marvel at the beauty and not have to deal with how messed up things were going to get.”

“You guys did that?” Wick asks. “I thought you were more interested in surviving.”

Monty laughs. “Not at first, trust me. There was a lot of ‘whatever the hell we want’, and hormones flying around the first few days. Even Bellamy got in on it.” He nods over at the man in question. “Especially him, actually.”

“Really? I know you said he was all about the chaos in the beginning, but I would have thought that he was more interested in keeping everyone alive,” Wick says, remembering Bellamy’s determination to do whatever needed to be done to stop the acid fog, including blowing up the system.

“Nah, that’s Clarke’s influence,” Monty says easily. “He was more interested in letting everyone’s hormones run freely, up to a point.”

“His sister?” Wick asks.

Monty nods in confirmation.

“Makes sense,” he murmurs under his breath. “So, did you take part in the ‘whatever the hell we want’ phase?”

“Nah. I was more interested in helping out Clarke, trying to seem cool, that sort of thing. Then Octavia was bitten, Jasper got hurt, we were on our own with no way to communicate. ‘Whatever the hell we want’ kind of fell by the wayside for me.”

“Is there someone you’d be interested in doing ‘whatever the hell you wanted’ with?” Wick’s voice is teasing. “One of the fine young men on this journey, perhaps?”

Monty snorts. “Lincoln’s taken, Bellamy is too tied up with Clarke to consider anyone else, even if I was interested, you’re with Raven…”

“I don’t know what Raven and I are,” Wick interjects. “But I’m heartbroken to be so quickly rejected.”

Monty rolls his eyes. “Okay, you and whatever with Raven, and I don’t really want to get to know Jackson better…”

“Why not? He could be fun, after he gets over acting like everything is going to hurt him.”

“Exactly. He’s too jumpy for me. I need someone smooth, confident, willing to take a risk. Someone who’s willing to get a big ass hammer for me, and who isn’t afraid to use it.”

Wick watches as Monty’s gaze slides over to Miller.

“I take it you’ve found someone then?” Wick nudges his shoulder playfully. “You should go for it.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Monty shrugs noncommittally.

“Trust me on this: if you find someone you want to be with, don’t be afraid to open up and be with them. I mean, if you aren’t ready, that’s fine, but sometimes it’s better to take a leap of faith, you know?”

Monty is silent for a few moments as they continue to walk together.

They stop for a rest break, and the group pulls out various flasks and sit down carefully in a circle with the Grounders on one side and the Sky People on the other, with neither side willing to bridge the gap fully. The closest they come is Octavia sitting down beside a Grounder with Lincoln right beside her.

“So, what are your stories about Clarke of the Sky People?” Bellamy asks after a few moments.

“She’s a legend,” one of the Grounders speaks immediately. “Some of us believe that she may be a god of some kind.”

Bellamy’s lips turn up at the corners at that. “What do you believe?”

The Grounders take turns saying what they believe about Clarke.

“She’s one of the gods from before who has decided to come back and seek vengeance on what was happening to our people.”

“She burnt the mountain to the ground and danced in its ashes.”

“She’s uneasy and not at peace with herself and has headed east to the sea.”

Wick notices that Bellamy’s head perks up a bit at that.

“Do you know if she made it?” he asks roughly.

“Maybe,” the man who spoke before says hesitantly. “I know she was possibly trying to make it to Luna’s clan, although she was secretive about why she would want to go there.”

Bellamy nods, as if this has some great significance to him which no one who isn't one of the original hundred would understand.

“She probably would,” he murmurs, almost to himself. “Nothing else?”

“No, except for the fact that she would move mountains and do anything to protect her people,” another one says solemnly.

“Sounds like her,” Bellamy says. “Break time over?”

He’s met with sounds of assent and the group begins to get up and continue on their way. Wick catches up to Bellamy.

“Are you going to go after her?” Wick asks.

“Go after who?” Bellamy asks, sounding distracted.

“You know, Clarke.”

“Oh. No.” It sounds to Wick like the thought of going after Clarke hasn’t gone through Bellamy’s mind, even after hearing where she might be.

“Why not?”

“Because she needed some time alone; she needed to get her head on straight, sort herself out before she could come back,” Bellamy says with an edge of finality.

“She didn’t actually say that, did she?” Wick ventures.

“No, but ‘I bear it, so they don’t have to’ comes close enough to it,” Bellamy admits. “Besides, Clarke can take care of herself. I trust her.”

“You trust that she’ll come back to you?”

“She always has before.” Bellamy shrugs. “Why stop?”

Wick feels a bit envious of how easily Bellamy trusts Clarke. He trusts Raven with his life, when it comes down to it, but he still isn’t quite sure of where he stands with her, and whether they’re at the point where they know they’ll come back to each other. Although from what he can tell, Bellamy and Clarke haven’t even slept together (probably haven’t had time), but there’s still a deep connection between the two.

“You’ve been through hell together, haven’t you?”

“‘Come what may, all bad fortune is to be conquered by endurance,’” Bellamy quotes with a shrug.

Wick glances at Bellamy out of the corner of his eye. “And you really believe that?”

“There have been times when I’ve had no idea whether I’d see Clarke again, and I have, so yeah, I guess I do.”

“Which is why you let her go off by herself,” Wick realizes. “Even though Abby would probably be pissed. Is pissed.”

“I know Clarke better than she knows herself sometimes, and she’s the same for me. So really, I was giving her what she needed, but not what I wanted,” Bellamy says, looking away.

“Which would have been for her to stay at the camp with you.”

Bellamy nods.

“‘Heavy is the head that wears the crown,’” Wick says to himself.

“Exactly,” Bellamy gives Wick a look of gratitude, as if that’s what he was expecting Wick to understand. And maybe Wick does. Everyone who was in Mount Weather has changed, and it’s evident in the way they interact with each other. It’s noticeable with the kids, and Wick thinks he’s starting to see the changes in himself. He’s a bit too serious at times, less likely to joke now, although he also feels like he should be joking; that that’s his spot in the group. Not someone to be trusted with taking the life of another person, and yet here he is. Man, beat a guy to death once, and everyone sees you as someone to be respected. Which is a twisted bit of respect, but it’s still there.

They walk until they reach a patch of forest which is indistinguishable from every other bit of the forest that they’ve walked through, at least in Wick’s experience. The sun seems to be a bit lower in the sky though, even if it isn’t quite dusk yet.

“The crash site is just a short walk through there,” Cova nods through the trees, “but I figured you would probably want to rest before going to see them.”

Bellamy’s jaw is tight when Wick glances over at him. “Thank you,” he says stiffly.

Cova nods. “We will leave you here.”

As one, Cova’s group fades into the trees, as silently as they appeared earlier in the day.

“That’s not creepy at all,” Wick mutters to himself.

“Alright, we’re still keeping watch tonight, just in case,” Bellamy says. “Now, who wants to come hunting with me?”

“I’ll come,” Miller volunteers.

“Great. Lincoln, can you figure out where we are, and if we’re as far off from where the crash site is as we should be?”

“I can do that,” Lincoln nods.

“I’ll start a fire,” Monty says.

“And Wick and I will collect wood.” Wick glances over at Octavia, and gives her a nod.

“Let’s do this.” Bellamy swaps out the gun he’s been carrying for a spear, and Miller does the same before the two young men head farther into the forest, pointedly away from where Cova and the rest of her group have disappeared.

“Let’s go,” Wick glances down to see Octavia by his side and nods.

They head out in a different direction from Bellamy and Miller.

They spend half an hour collecting wood for a fire, neither of them speaking much, before returning to camp and dumping the wood in their arms.

“Welcome back,” Monty says. “Bellamy and Miller aren’t back yet, but that just means we can have a decent fire going by the time they return.”

Monty quickly puts a campfire together, and the group sits down to wait for the others to come back. Hours pass, and Wick starts to get worried.

“Should we go look for them?” he asks hesitantly. “I mean, they could be bleeding out somewhere, or fallen off the side of a cliff or something.”

Octavia’s head jerks up sharply at that. “Don’t joke about that,” she scolds. “Besides, they’re fine. They’re both warriors; they can take care of themselves.”

“Don’t you worry?” Wick asks.

“It’s not within my control, so I don’t worry about it.” Octavia pulls out her knife to sharpen it by the firelight.

Wick leaves her to her knife sharpening before turning to Monty beside him. “So, how excited are you to see your parents again?”

“On a scale of one to Kelvin? Probably Kelvin.”

Wick snorts. “I bet they’re going to be ecstatic to see you.”

“Maybe, or maybe they’ll be ashamed that their son is a delinquent.”

“Hey, your parents aren’t ashamed of you.” Wick bumps Monty’s shoulder. “Your mom wouldn’t shut up about you while you were in lockup.”

“Yeah?” Monty asks hopefully.

“Yeah. Besides, not everyone would be able to figure out how to make hallucinogenic substances out of innocent plants.”

Monty snorts. “Education at its finest.”

“Exactly.”

They sit in a comfortable silence for a few moments before a rustling in the trees makes the group tense. Wick pulls his gun closer and Monty pulls a knife out of his boot, while Octavia holds her knife in a proper grip, and Lincoln draws his sword. Jackson has grabbed a rifle as well, his grip slightly awkward.

Two figures emerge from the trees, something dark and heavy slung low between them.

Wick lets out an internal sigh of relief when he realises that it’s Bellamy and Miller, and they have returned with food.

“Sorry we’re late,” Bellamy says. “It took us longer to catch dinner than we thought.”

A look of relief flashes across Octavia’s face. “It’s not a problem,” she says. “Let’s eat dinner.”

The former delinquents quickly skin and prepare the animal. Monty has been making a spit while they wait, so it’s easy to place the animal on the stick and over the fire.

“So, what are we eating today?” Wick asks jokingly.

“No idea,” Bellamy grunts “But it will taste all right in the end anyway. At least it’s edible.”

“All right, good to know. I always want to make sure my food is edible before I eat it.”

“That’s always a good idea,” Lincoln’s voice is low and amused over the fire.

Wick smiles to himself as the meat cooks, quiet conversation occurring amongst the group. After a while, the meat is done and taken off the spit; Miller hacks it up with a knife, and Monty places it on sticks and passes the meat around. The former delinquents and Lincoln immediately start eating, while Jackson hesitantly looks at his food. Wick takes an experimental sniff of his portion before diving in and biting off a chunk.

The meat is rich and flavourful, and definitely nothing like they had on the Ark. Wick holds back a moan of pleasure with difficulty.

“This is so good,” he says with a mouthful of food.

“Isn’t it?” Bellamy asks with a small grin.

“Might be the best thing I’ve ever had. Darling, where were you all my life?” he asks the meat still on his stick.

“Waiting down on Earth for you; just for you,” Monty jokes.

“Never leave me again, darling.” He pauses for a moment, thinking through his statement. “Or, do, but…”

Lincoln gives a small smile at that statement.

“I think we know what you meant,” Miller says.

“Seriously, why has the council not approved a hunting trip yet?” Wick addresses Bellamy. “Think of the rations we could save for winter.”

“That’s what I’ve been saying,” Bellamy says, a hint of frustration in his voice. “But they’ve been stubborn in their stance that it’s unsafe, and that it’s not worth the risk.”

“Well, what are we going to do when the rations run out?” Wick asks reasonably. “Melt down the metal and figure out how we’re going to eat that?”

Miller snorts. “They said we had enough supplies to last in space for six generations, and look what happened.”

Monty mimes something falling and then an explosion, complete with sound effects.

“Exactly,” Miller says to Monty, a hint of amusement in his voice.

The corners of Monty’s lips quirk up.

Lincoln has been watching the conversation occur with a smile playing on the corner of his lips.

“How many people need to be convinced for there to be a mission?” he asks.

“Technically, it’s just one: Chancelor Griffin. But realistically, the entire council is going to have to be convinced, because they have to make a decision as a group,” Bellamy says.

“You’re not on the council?” Lincoln asks.

“Nope. Clarke asked me to keep our people safe, so that’s what I’m doing. Besides, I don’t know if I would want to be on the council.”

“You might be acceptable,” Wick says, remembering the things Bellamy was able to do in Mount Weather as their inside man.

“There’s also the anarchist philosophy I had in the early days which would have almost killed not only us on the ground, but everyone on the Ark as well. Besides, I like being Clarke’s co-leader and backup.” Bellamy shrugs.

“You do have an aptitude for it,” Lincoln says. “They were very impressed with you in TonDC.”

Bellamy grunts. “I bet they were.”

“But you’re right; they liked Clarke better.”

“Not surprised.” There’s a hint of pride in his voice. “Everyone likes Clarke.”

“But you should make a serious effort to get the council to agree to a hunting trip. I’ll back you up if you want,” Miller chimes in.

“Me too,” Monty says.

“Well, this meat is almost as good as doing some loving, so count me in as well,” Wick adds.

“Cubed!” Jackson chimes in.

Bellamy gives a slight smile at that. “Thanks, really.”

“Hey, if your friends won’t back you up on trips to get orgasmic-inducing meat, who can you trust? Is that a side-effect?” Wick asks Lincoln.

“Not that I know of, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there was an animal out there which helps with that. I can show you some plants which have that effect though.” Lincoln’s voice is completely serious.

“Are there more like those hallucinogenic nuts? Because I’m pretty sure I ate a pinecone after trying those,” Monty says.

Bellamy grunts. “Could have been worse.”

“I. Ate. A. Pine. Cone. It hurt coming out the other end.”

“Whoa, now, Monty, I know we’re close, but we’re not that close,” Wick interjects playfully. “Save your discussions about what’s happening with your ass for someone who’s going to be in contact with it.” He glances over at Miller.

“Shut up,” Monty says, also glancing over at Miller.

“Well, now that that’s over, how about them paths to Agro?” Wick asks.

Bellamy pulls out the map and spreads it out on the ground in front of him. Lincoln shuffles over so he can see better.

“Well, we should be here,” Bellamy points to a spot on the map, “but I’m not sure if we actually are. Lincoln?”

Lincoln looks over the map as well. “Well, they were right in saying that this route would be faster than the route we were originally planning on taking, so I guess we could thank them. The fallen station should be no more than an hour or two walk from our current point.”

“Excellent,” Bellamy says, rolling the map back up.

They decide to go to sleep shortly after, and the former delinquents wrap up the remaining meat to take it along.

“There’s lunch for the next few days,” Bellamy says.

Wick gives an overdramatic sigh. “I’m so glad. I don’t know how I’ll ever go back to rations.”

Bellamy glances over at him. “Well, if we get approval for a hunting party, you won’t have to.”

The group lays out their blankets and settle down to sleep with Bellamy sitting with his back against a tree, a loose grip on his gun.

“Have a good watch,” Wick says to Bellamy, snuggling down into his blankets.

Bellamy gives him a nod of acknowledgement, and Wick closes his eyes, quickly drifting off to sleep and dreaming about orgasmic meat and Raven.

\--------

They wake early the next morning and quickly get on their way, scuffing out the low burning embers and making sure they’ve left no bits of meat behind.

The walk to the crash site is relatively easy, and Wick can tell they’re getting closer by the bits of metal that litter the ground. It doesn’t look like there are as many pieces as there were at the crash site for Factory station after a group of engineers and guards went back to look for salvageable parts, which is a good sign. It means that there are hopefully more survivors here than there were at Factory with just Mel. There’s hope, as fragile of a thing as that is.

Monty starts walking quicker the closer they get to the site, excitement starting to show in his features and the faintest hint of hope in his eyes.

They round one more tree and are met with curious gazes and guns pointed at their chests. Wick instinctively raises his hands and watches from the corners of his eyes as the others do the same, calmly and slowly.

A man shouts to the men on either side of him, “Hold your fire!”

The guns are dropped the slightest bit so they’re pointed at the ground rather than at the group.

“Who are you?” the man asks.

Bellamy instantly steps forward. “Bellamy Blake, sir. And this is Octavia, Lincoln, Monty, Wick, Miller, and I’m sure you know Jackson.”

Recognition flashes in the man’s eyes. “Aren’t you the man who shot the Chancellor?”

Bellamy’s chin rises the slightest bit as he stares levelly at the other man. “Yes. And you are?”

“I’m Chase,” he says tersely before continuing. “I thought you were sentenced to floating.”

“I was pardoned.” Bellamy’s voice is even.

“Huh,” the man says, almost to himself. “Any other survivors?”

“Forty-eight of the original set of teenagers who were sent to earth and about four hundred at Camp Jaha. We’re still looking for the other stations. Took a bit because Mount Weather was jamming our signal.”

“And now it’s not? I thought we were supposed to be trying to head to Mount Weather for supplies.”

“Things… changed,” Bellamy says vaguely. “Now the plan is to find the other stations and get everyone back to Camp Jaha before winter hits.”

“How much time do we have?”

“About three weeks,” Lincoln finally speaks. “The frost is going to increase and it will eventually snow. It’s only going to get colder from now.”

Chase takes Lincoln in for the first time. His eyes are wary and hard as he assesses him. “What are you doing with _him_?”

Bellamy shifts his stance slightly to a more defensive one. “He’s one of us. He left his clan and way of life to join us. We’re lucky to have him.”

“Sure, until he tries to kill you.”

Wick notices Octavia tensing up at the accusations against Lincoln. Lincoln’s eyes meet hers and he gives a slight shake of his head. Octavia relaxes slightly but still watches carefully.

“He won’t.” Bellamy’s voice is strong with conviction. “Now can we talk about logistics? How many people survived?”

Chase blinks slowly before refocusing. “About two hundred, maybe? We’ve lost a few in the month we’ve been down here since we didn’t get a medic on our station.”

Bellamy nods. “What did they die from?”

“Injuries from landing, mostly. A couple died from attempting to eat poisonous plants, and some others found a lake and were trying to learn to swim when they were caught by something in the water. We’ve been living off the rations from our station, trying to make them go as far as we can, and harvesting what edible plants we can find.”

“All right. Jackson is going to take a look at you, see if there’s any injuries which may have been missed. The rest of us are going to help take inventory, figure out if there’s anything worth taking back, and we’ll start heading back tomorrow.”

“Excuse me, but aren’t the rest of you delinquents? Weren’t you locked up for your crimes? Who let you lead this trip?”

“Chancellor Griffin. If you have a problem with us leading the expedition to come find you, take it up with her when we get back,” Bellamy states.

Chase gives a slight start at that information before recovering. “Believe me, I will,” he says.

“Can we come into your camp now?” Bellamy asks.

“Sure, come on in.” Chase waves them forward.

The other guards on duty watch them closely as they pass.

The first thing Wick notices is how much smaller the camp is than Camp Jaha or even the drop ship campsite the delinquents made before they were captured. There are more people here than there were at the drop ship, and the space is tight and slightly cramped in places. It’s as if the people who built it were more concerned with taking up as little space as possible than they were to be able to expand and finally live with fewer restrictions on the ground.

Monty catches up with Chase. “Hey, can you tell me if the Greens made it down?”

“Yeah, they did. They live over in that section.” He points in the general direction.

Monty looks at Bellamy with a hopeful expression, silently asking if he can go.

“Go,” Bellamy says, “but take Miller with you.”

A smile flashes over Monty’s face for a second. “Of course. Come on, Miller.”

Miller falls into step with him quickly, and the pair heads over to the section to find his parents.

Bellamy’s lips quirk up at that. “So, how do you want to do the exams?”

The two men start talking logistics before they reach what passes for a mess hall in the camp.

“Lunch is coming up soon,” Chase says. “I’ll tell everyone when they gather.”

“Sounds good to me,” Bellamy says. “Mind if we sit?”

“Not at all,” Chase nods toward a table in invitation. “Help yourselves.”

The group quickly sits at the table, dropping their packs on the ground. Wick leans over the table and closes his eyes briefly, relishing in the chance to be able to sit after having walked for two days with minimal breaks.

“How’s everyone doing?” Bellamy asks quietly.

“Doing fine,” Wick says. “Would be doing better if I could get a massage though. The tension in my shoulders is unbelievable. I don’t know how you kids do it.”

“Necessity,” Bellamy says, deadpan.

“I’ll keep that in mind if I ever decide to go on another trip with you guys. You’re intense.”

“This is a good day,” Octavia says. “We haven’t had anything try to kill us yet.”

“Way to set the bar low,” Wick says.

“I try,” she responds.

Wick quirks his lips up at that.

The group sits in a comfortable silence, occasionally talking about nothing while waiting for the time to pass. They share some jokes and laugh quietly amongst themselves.

When the sun is almost at its peak in the sky, a loud foghorn-like sound passes through the camp. A few moments later, voices start to come closer to the hall, and people start filing in and sitting down at the various tables. Wick quickly spots Monty’s shaggy mop and Miller’s close cut hair amongst the crowd. He gives a wave, and the pair start heading towards the table, an older couple following them.

“Guys, I found them!” Monty says as soon as he approaches the table and starts to sit down along with Miller, and motions with his head for the couple to join them. “These are my parents, Orwell and Shelley. Mom, Dad, these are my friends, Octavia, Lincoln, Bellamy, and Wick. Octavia, Bellamy, and I were on the drop ship together; we met Lincoln during our first month on the ground, and you know Wick from my internships.”

Octavia gives a friendly smile. “It’s so nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Green. Monty talks about you a lot.”

Mrs. Green gives Octavia a warm, if slightly tight grin. “I’ve heard about you as well, Octavia Blake.”

Octavia lifts her chin slightly at that.

“So, Wick, how are you doing?” Mr. Green asks.

“Fine, sir. Life on the ground has kept me busy,” Wick says easily.

“I’ll bet,” Mr. Green says. “It’s not easy surviving, is it?”

Wick lets memories of his time in Mount Weather wash over him for a moment. The fear of getting caught, the pain in his arm after the explosion, the fear of losing Raven when the Mountain Men started drilling into her, fearing they were all going to die with no hope.

“No, it’s not,” he agrees. “Sometimes it’s the hardest thing in the world.”

“But it’s worth the fight,” Mr. Green continues.

Wick thinks about the new-found solidarity he has with the delinquents, making Raven laugh with his stupid jokes, the fact that they’ve survived being on the ground, even with all the danger they’ve faced.

“Yeah, it is.” He gives a small smile.

The rest of the station is talking amongst themselves when Chase steps onto a small platform and calls out, “May I have your attention please?”

The crowd slowly quiets and everyone turns to face him.

“We have some visitors today,” Chase says. “They came from Camp Jaha, which is the main camp for the Ark survivors, from what I’ve been told. They came to ask us if we would like to return with them.”

A cheer rises from the crowd. Wick watches as people turn to their neighbours and start to excitedly talk about what it would mean to head back to a main camp with better medical supplies and more food.

Chase attempts to get the crowd to settle down after a bit. “Quiet, quiet, please. I know this is very exciting, but I still have some things to tell you.”

“Why did they come today?” a voice calls out from the crowd. “Why couldn’t they have come earlier?”

Chase nods in the direction of their table and Wick stands to explain.

“Mount Weather was jamming our signals, so we couldn’t communicate with anyone. We only recently fixed that problem, and it took us a bit to get the parts to make a radio transmitter and sort through the radio frequencies before we found the one that was broadcasting from here. We came as soon as we could.”

Chase nods in satisfaction at the explanation. “They came as soon as they could, and that’s really what matters. The more important question is, who’s ready to go see some more of our people?”

A cheer rose through the crowd again.

“Good, because there’s some things we need to do first before we can get on the road to Camp Jaha. Here’s what we need to do…”

Wick sits back in his seat and grins as Chase outlines the plan quickly.

“Now, I know you’re all hungry, and I don’t want to keep you waiting. You can go grab a tray now, and I’ll be around to answer any questions you may have. Or you can ask the group that came,” he nods in the direction of their table.

As a group, the rescue party push their chairs back and join the line for the mess hall. Lincoln and Octavia talk easily as they wait in line, and Wick listens as Monty tells his parents stories about his time on the ground, Miller standing close to him.

Wick allows himself a small smile. Everything seems to be working out in their favour. It is going to be a good day, with the work to be done. The only thing that would have made it better is if Reyes was with them, but he could wait until he got home to see her. Life is good.


End file.
